The current white jersey holder Cian Uijtdebroeks (Visma-Lease a Bike) has been forced to abandon the Giro d’Italia with illness ahead of stage 11, following a similar abandon from teammate Olav Kooij 24 hours earlier.
The team made the announcement on Wednesday morning. “The Giro will have to continue without the biggest smile of the peloton,” the statement read. “We regret to announce that Cian Uijtdebroeks is forced to abandon the race. Cian did not feel well the past days and after yesterday’s stage, he fell ill.”
Kooij left the race on Tuesday, ahead of stage 10 with what the team described as a fever. Israel-Premier Tech’s Ethan Vernon was also forced to abandon with what the team described as an “acute respiratory viral infection with fever”.
The departure of Uijtdebroeks marks a major blow for Visma-Lease a Bike, as the Belgian rider was the team leader, the only GC contender and the leader in the best young rider’s white jersey competition. Retaining the white jersey had most likely become the team's overall target in the 2024 race.
Uijtdebroeks had been sat fifth overall, 4:15 on maglia rosa Tadej Pogačar (UAE Team Emirates) after losing time on stage 10. The Belgian looked far from his best on the Bocca della Selva climb and ceded time to his close rivals.
Antonio Tiberi (Bahrain Victorious), who started the day in sixth, gained nine seconds, while the top four overall all moved a further 13 seconds ahead of Uijtdebroeks after the summit finish.
More dramatically, Kooij and Uijtdebroeks’ departures add to teammates Christophe Laporte and Robert Gesink leaving earlier in the race, meaning Visma-Lease a Bike now has only four riders competing at the Giro.
Jan Tratnik, Attila Valter, Edoardo Affini and Tim van Dijke will be left to try and chase breakaways for the remainder of the 11 stages as the Slovenian had done on stage 10 before being caught in the final 4km, but this was perhaps a sign that Visma knew Uijdtebroeks wasn't 100% right.
"This morning, we came to the decision to take Cian [Uijdtebroeks] out of the race and we are extremely disappointed that we needed to take him out. Especially also after we had to take Olav [Kooij] out yesterday," said sports director Marc Reef via the team. "We were thinking that especially after the victory of Olav, that we have everything to play for.
"We are now in a situation that both of our guys where we had big goals with, where we could fight for, they are both out and it's a huge setback also for the team. We came here, we prepared ourselves for months.
"Still, with 11 days to come, with four guys that are healthy, that are ready to go - they also prepared for weeks, for months to fight for our goals in these weeks. We still have the goal to fight for stage wins. I think you also saw yesterday with Jan [Tratnik] what we can do after a setback and we are still really there to fight for our chances that are coming up."
